Mockingbirds at Dusk in a Time of War - poem

  

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Mockingbirds at Dusk in a Time of War

 

They might be fighting; they might be he-ing and she-ing

Their leaf-rich oak could be their arena

Or it might serve them as their bower of bliss

For love in this magnolia-scented dusk

 

They’re still at it, whatever their “it” might be

But breaking off to blitz the subtle cat

Sneaking about in quest of a bunny or squirrel

But who from feathered fury must now retreat

 

They might be fighting; they might be he-ing and she-ing

But then

                   They might be mocking the rest of us

 

 

Bower of bliss – cf. Spenser’s The Faerie Queene

Petite Bourgeois, Personal, and Self-Indulgent - poem

 

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Petite Bourgeois, Personal, and Self-Indulgent

 

I used to admire your poetry. I shouldn't admire it now. I should find it

absurdly personal. Don't you agree? Feelings, insights, affections...

it's suddenly trivial now.

 

-Strelnikov to Yuri in Doctor Zhivago (film)

 

In the evenings I sit on my summer lawn

Slouched in an old, much-painted metal chair

That symbol of petite-bourgeois respectability

With a little table for my drink, my pipe, my book

 

(The cat pads by on errands of his own)

 

At dusk a friend or two might amble along

And join me for a glass, a smoke, a talk

We casually swat at mosquitoes and rumors

And argue about Doctor Zhivago and Lonesome Dove

 

(A fast-diving mockingbird mocks the cat)

 

In a fallen world of chaos and suffering

With fear of revolution in the air

Is it right to indulge ourselves with such trifles

As sitting and talking with old friends in the twilight?

 

Oh, yes

 

(The cat and the mockingbird continue their game)

Little Children are Much Like Dachshund Puppies - rhyming couplet

 

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Little Children are Much Like Dachshund Puppies

 

With wildly scattered toys the lawn is messed -

Little children came to visit – O how we are blessed!

From Shakespeare: My Spirit is Thine, the Better Part of Me - poem

  

 

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

From Shakespeare: My Spirit is Thine, the Better Part of Me

 

Cf. Shakespeare’s Sonnet 74

 

No kinsman could offer comfort there,
To a soul left drowning in desolation.

 

-“The Seafarer,” trans. Burton Raffel

 

When we die, our little things disappear:

Hairbrushes and pocketknives, fountain pens

Car keys, spare change, books, clothes, unopened mail

A souvenir coffee cup from Canada

 

An old uniform, a pistol from the war

A clock, a crucifix, Topsider shoes

Family pictures, a graduation ring

A magnifying glass, a radio

 

Bits and bobs, all sorts of trivial stuff

And a poem for you – it’s not enough

 

Book Removal Training - poem

 

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Book Removal Training

 

The orange flames waved at the crowd as paper and print dissolved inside them. Burning words were torn from their sentences.

 

-The Book Thief, p. 112

 

And now burning words must be torn from free people

For if people read they might think about things:

Why does the Party’s Jesus hate everyone

And why are weapons superior to ideas

 

Can a hangperson’s noose teach us to love

Burning crosses comfort a frightened child

Do the cult’s censors fly our flag upside down

While stealing books from our children’s hands

 

A state that trains people to purge library books

Is a slave state

 

 

Florida revises school library book removal training after public outcry

Story by Douglas Soule, USA TODAY NETWORK

 

Florida revises school library book removal training after public outcry (msn.com)

A Congressssssinal Hearing - poem

  

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

 

A Congressssssional Hearing

 

 

“But hiss for hiss return’d with forked tongue”

 

-Paradise Lost, X.518

 

 

Men in nice suits meet in air-conditioned luxury

Ties perfectly knotted, Cain’s mark on their lapels

Enthroned behind paneled tables of polished oak

Where by the magic of a secular oath, all are honorables

 

There is a chair, who is a man, not a chair

Who wields an oaken gavel of authority

As he smiles benignly and modestly

An ‘umble adornment to the Republic

 

Then “bash!” goes the gavel, and yelling begins

And no one seems to know why

The God of Children and Blueberries - poem

 

Lawrence Hall HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

The God of Children and Blueberries

 

For Theo (who is three today) and Nora (who is more than three)

 

“It is eaten, and renewed, every day.”

 

-Ramandu’s daughter in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

 

God is prodigal with his seasons and feasts -

This is the season of blueberries, each day a feast

Great clouds of fat blue globes hang upon the little trees

Water and sky shading into Prussian blue

 

This is a table-tree, all are invited

To stand with buckets and thirsty lips

To pick and take, to take and eat, each day

The feast magically renewed each dawn

 

Mockingbirds, robins, sparrows, rabbits, and squirrels

 

And children

 

Picking, pecking, plucking, nibbling, biting

 

All at Aslan’s Table, and all at peace